… Kill the procrastinator inside you. Kill the lazy bastard writer and nurture the benevolent workaholic writer. He’s in there somewhere. Check the closet; he’s probably cowering in the back behind the shoes …

A few weeks ago I was telling a friend of mine about how I’d love to get published, and all the wonderful things I’d do with the advance money and the traveling and book tours and all that good stuff that comes with being a successful author.

She sighed heavily and said, “Just shut up and write already!”

Naturally I was kind of offended by this statement at first. I write, don’t I? It may not look like it sometimes, because I tend to stare off into space (which is the way writers work, coincidentally) but to the outsider this only sounds like excuses – and if heard often enough they begin to sound like what they really are; a deflection , a ruse, a way to make the question go away. I write, sure. Am I producing anything? Maybe not. I blog a lot, gotta build a fan base, get to know people. But in the end we write to produce stories, not blog posts. At least for me that’s the goal.